He can guard ISOs in the low post. That's what I got from the article.

That's not really how basketball is played by the good teams. Bargnani is slow and can't jump, so he doesn't leave his man and couldn't anyway and layups ensue.

You are either good at defense or not. He's a good man-to-man defender? What? What does that mean? He gets a lot of help. Per possession may not tell it with Bargnani because he doesn't rebound and his teammates offer him help. And the author acknowledges Bargnani provides poor help himself. Help defense is not optional. It is a major tenet in every man defense. You must rotate help according to the gameplan otherwise teams will gets easy buckets.

I don't think the argument here is that Bargnani is some defensive guru, just that he's not as horrible as he's been made out to be. he doesn't have to be a superior team defender. He's not the anchor on the Knicks defense. he's a bench scorer/stretch four here, not a starting C.

Dude is a proven 20pt scorer in the league. He's had a rough last two years, no doubt, but two years ago, he was a top 10 center ranked roughly on a par with Brook Lopez when he was paired with Chris Bosh. He struggled since becoming the focal point, but the knicks don't need him to be the focal point.

"When you look at KG, probably no back-to-backs, but those are just topics right now that are being thrown around," Kidd said Friday.

At the end of next year, Bargnani, MWP, Udrih is going to turn out to be > Garnett, Pierce, Terry for a third of the money.

Ummm, other than REALLLLLLLLLLLY wanting this to happen because "Knicks the best!!!" why would you think that? Terry is also an odd 3rd to pick from for the Nets considering if we're going by "3 biggest offseason moves" AK47 was clearly the 3rd. But either way:

"When you look at KG, probably no back-to-backs, but those are just topics right now that are being thrown around," Kidd said Friday.

At the end of next year, Bargnani, MWP, Udrih is going to turn out to be > Garnett, Pierce, Terry for a third of the money.

Ummm, other than REALLLLLLLLLLLY wanting this to happen because "Knicks the best!!!" why would you think that? Terry is also an odd 3rd to pick from for the Nets considering if we're going by "3 biggest offseason moves" AK47 was clearly the 3rd. But either way:

Well, I think Udrih is clearly better than Terry at this point in their respective careers for this year and beyond.

While certainly if you look at Bargnani's 2012-13 he's going to compare poorly, I don't think it's reasonable to take that one injury riddled year out of context. I mean the season prior his PER was 17.9 and he's 27 coming off an elbow injury, not 37 coming off the latest episode of chronic knee injury (I'm looking at you, KG)

Pierce/Garnett/Terry are all in decline.

I don't think it's unreasonable to compare the C/PF, SF and combo guard, to the C/PF, SF and combo guard. You can throw in Kirilenko if you want.

Doesn't change the fact that at the end of the day, I think it's a reasonable possibility that at the end of next year the combination of a healthy year and better role for Bargnani will make him the best player out of the entire group in this discussion, especially if age, injury, and disinterest continue to plague Pierce/Garnett as they did last year.

Pierce/MWP is a toss up. they have different games, but they will both bring a needed to role to their respective teams and still play good hoops most of the time. MWP's defense will probably age better than Pierce's offense.

I doubt there is anyone not wearing orange and blue who would call Pierce and MWP a toss-up. I mean, thats like absurd.

Ditto Bargnani and KG.

You wanna argue Udrih vs. Terry I guess thats a debate, but its fairly inconsequential insofar as the successes of each franchise. I definitely don't agree with the definitive statement you conclude on, but THATS at least a toss-up.

I doubt there is anyone not wearing orange and blue who would call Pierce and MWP a toss-up. I mean, thats like absurd.

Ditto Bargnani and KG.

You wanna argue Udrih vs. Terry I guess thats a debate, but its fairly inconsequential insofar as the successes of each franchise. I definitely don't agree with the definitive statement you conclude on, but THATS at least a toss-up.

See, I watched a lot of Celtics games last year. If you want to talk about Paul Pierce career versus MWP career it's no contest. I agree with you there, but that's not what I said.

I said this upcoming year, as to which will prove to be "better" in their different roles for their different teams, I think it's a toss up. If the Nets get a reasonably healthy, motivated year from Pierce, he'll be better than a similar year for MWP.

But, having watched a lot of the Celtics this last season, I can tell you for certain that both healthy and motivated are big question marks re: Pierce. He can't consistently create his own shot anymore, or defend opposing wingmen.

Maybe he has a renaissance, but I hold to the idea that at the end of the day Pierce and Garnett and Terry are aging/declining veterans who's best games are behind them, who's bodies are failing, and who very possibly won't be able to perform at a high level during the season and be healthy for the playoffs.

And that I can see a scenario where there's enough missed games, poor performances, signs of age, that Bargnani/MWP/Udrih turns out to be the better trio.

I doubt there is anyone not wearing orange and blue who would call Pierce and MWP a toss-up. I mean, thats like absurd.

Ditto Bargnani and KG.

You wanna argue Udrih vs. Terry I guess thats a debate, but its fairly inconsequential insofar as the successes of each franchise. I definitely don't agree with the definitive statement you conclude on, but THATS at least a toss-up.

Pierce is going to be marginalized into a small role for the Nets compared to his Celtics run. World Peace is already used to being a role player and performs his role quite well. Not to mention Pierce is 36 years old and basketball player declines sometimes happen extremely quickly. Shumpert basically embarrassed Pierce on many possessions in the playoffs because Pierce seems to be slowing down. Peace on the other hand is 34 years old. It's also kind of crazy to try to use something like "win shares" in basketball--basketball is a team sport; baseball is essentially an individual sport and so it's easier to attempt to quantify such things.

I'm not going to argue Bargnani is better than KG because I still think KG is a solid defender and an efficient scorer (again with the age concerns though as he's 37 years old and the decline could come at any time). Bargnani will help the Knicks, however, in a big way. He is an offensive force not just with what he can do himself but with the way he can change opponents' game plans. He'll help Melo get more one-on-one opportunities and help clear the paint for him. This will be invaluable.

It's also kind of crazy to try to use something like "win shares" in basketball--basketball is a team sport; baseball is essentially an individual sport and so it's easier to attempt to quantify such things.

Kind of crazy, as in, kind of like justifying an evaluation based on a prognostication of eventual roles and how guys will respond and predicting rapid age-based declines that would marginalize what is currently a pretty significant talent and effectiveness difference?

I'm not saying using b-ref's win shares is a fool-proof argument, but if its that or judging, on a comparative basis, how valuable a guy is going to be by guessing their increased/decreased role, how their psyche is effected, how schematically they might adjust, predicting rapid age based decline at an arbitrary cutoff point (36 is baddddd, 34 is fine)....I know which one seems a lot more tangible and justifiable to me.

It's not an arbitrary age cutoff. KG/Pierce/Terry are 37/36/36 this season respectively. They all had significant drop off over the last two or three seasons from their primes. KG has serious knee issues similar to Amare in that already in the off-season limited minutes and no back to backs are a given. It's not "predicting rapid age decline" it's acknowledging that KG in particular and all three of the new Nets nee Celtics have already shown "significant age decline" and it is, I think, unlikely that they will reverse that.

I also think it's reasonable to take the over on the 28 year old Bargnani coming back from a year of injury and returning to a reasonable facsimile of the 20pt/5rb per 36 minutes big man he was each of the four years prior to last years injury, especially considering he'll be a secondary scoring option, and not the featured scorer.

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